Spork

Okay so Monika wakes up, she’s in a hospital, the program just got deleted. But now she’s alive…and in a hospital. Mc is right there and looks…guilty? What? Turns out she’s been in a coma for like a day after intervening in an altercation that resulted in some serious head trauma. Turns out he was the one who resulted in her getting that trauma (maybe he sacked her with a chair or something). Turns out she’d vomited and collapsed a few hours after the fight and ended up in a coma. Huh?

Now she’s dropped into what might be the real world? Was the entire game just some sick coma dream? Was it real? It felt real…it still feels real. Despite being in “the real world” everything still feels like it’s the game. She’s still so angry, so scared, so violent (it makes her sick). She doesn’t get that post dream clarity were she realizes it didn’t make sense and she’s safe. She can still see the small tears in reality all around her. The world’s still staticky, she still can’t tell her friends faces apart, her ears still ring, she’s still seeing things nobody else can. She’s still scared. They doctors say it’s brain damage, she says she never left the game.

Uhh key points for now: everyone’s kinda freaked out, in like a day Monika went from being the perfect student, athletic, popular, kind, to…a wreck. She’s not really taking care of herself, she doesn’t seem all the way there. Also, her pupils have been dialated this entire time (head trauma can do that, and also i head canon that her pupils are big asf in game cuz she’s been like…blinded by the knowledge. Yk?) and that’s probably not good. They’re treating her like a ticking time bomb (and loathe as she is to admit it, they’re probably right) and have no idea how to act around her, and she has no idea how to act around them. She doesn’t even try to pretend anymore, mc knows, so why’s it matter? He deleted her, she won’t try to appease to him. So she’s just…yeah not doing good

A big arc is around her and mc, she resents him for “doing this to her” both in the possible brain damage but also the game, she resents him for making her aware. She resents him so so so much. But eventually she comes to terms with what happens, both in game and in reality

This is about recovery, more specifically coming to terms with this new situation. She’s not giving up but rather accepting it all. She accepts that this might be a game or might be reality, but either way it doesn’t matter because she’s going to treat it like reality anyways. She accepts she’s always going to be changed by what happened, and she’s never going to “return to normal” but that doesn’t mean she needs to suffer or this garnetees suffering. Uhh not sure how we’re gonna deal with the whole “I’ve killed people” before but maybe she breaks down and is like “yo idek if this was real but I killed you” and maybe upon exploring everything all of her weird behaviors get explained and it’s like “ohhhh.” Idk. I’m working on it

Monika: chicken scratcher!! Her lines aren’t confident at ALL, and her form’s always a little fucked up because she focuses too much on be little details and not enough on the general form of the object. She also only really does still life, but she never thinks it’s close enough, and it stresses her out. She’d probably benefit from learning to paint and learning how to block out her drawings, but oh well.

Sayori: doodles tbh, in canon Id argue she doodles kinda absent mindedly, she doodles a lot but she never really draws. But assuming she actually likes to draw/wants to draw, I think she’d be really good at it. Like she studies all the concepts and is really into visual storytelling, she LOVES color theory (like what colors create what tone for the drawing) and shape theory. She particularly likes to create stories through the designs of the characters she makes. She’s largely doing oc pieces but she can do other stuff.

Yuri: in canon I don’t think she draws at all, she picked it up when she was younger but she wasn’t very good (cuz she was a beginner) and doesn’t like to reflect on those times. However also assuming she likes/wants to draw, she draws realistically and is only ever drawing fan art. Despite her drawing realistically, her anatomy isn’t very good, and she HATES doing faces and hands. I feel like she’s self taught and refuses to learn the basics because she’s only really drawing as a hobby. She also does that graphite shading thing beginners do, you know? Like where they put some graphite on the page and smear it for shading, but it never really looks good but she thinks it makes it look more realistic. Yeah i think she’d does that because I used to do that. I feel like Yuri’s art looks REALLY good to people who don’t draw, but to professionals her art is…it’s definitely from a beginner if you understand.

Natsuki: I feel like she draws fanart a lot, but specially in the style of the manga she’s reading, or if not in a “cutesy anime” style. You know the ones. Like early 2000s specifically. Either that style OR (ironically) kinda the style the actual game is in (though not the shading, she cell shades, and obviously more amature). I feel like Natsuki ALSO didn’t study the basics, but despite that, she still understands them (she accidentally taught herself them), and her art is actually less amature than Yuri’s, and as time goes on, Yuri actually realizes that. I also feel like she just draws her characters out in the void, and despises backgrounds.

Anyways, the 3 notice Monika’s not…doing well. Which they find weird and really concerning because she often seemed the most stable out of all of them, and she just…flipped. Like she walked in looking shellshocked and didn’t even apologize for being the last one in and go “ugh I’m the President, I should be better than this.”

And like, at some point Monika has a panic attack (bc holy shit! Nothings real!) and Yuri finds her like, tucked away in a corner or something (either Monika can’t mess with the code yet but is aware, or she’s too freaked out to mess with the code) and helps her calm down. Or perhaps it doesn’t work and Monika runs off or something (bc Yuri’s just a reminder of how not real everything is). And Yuri’s like “uh oh, this isn’t good.”

I feel like Natsuki KNOWS something’s wrong but isn’t sure how to bring it up, and kinda just makes a statement about it to the air and hopes Monika opens up about it or perhaps Monika isn’t there and she hopes someone will agree and/or explain wtf is going on.

I feel like Sayori knows something’s wrong, doesn’t know what exactly caused it, but has experienced something similar, or at least can note her behaviors in Monika. In doing so, she’s like “omg, Monika’s in a REALLY bad spot rn” and she’s actually the one to do something. I feel like Monika tries to blow it off because there’s no way she could tell Sayori about this, she doesn’t want to destroy her like she’s been, but Sayori doesn’t back down because Monika was there for her, and this is what friends do.

And it could go any way, but I’m hoping (bleeding heart💔) Monika relents, but there’s no way she tells her literally nothings real, maybe she just starts with that nothing feels real, just vague enough. But then the floodgates open and she’s ranting about how nobody feels human, that she feels trapped, that life feels meaningless, that it’s scary, that it’s painful, that it feels like falling and she doesn’t know when she’s going to hit the ground. And Sayori’s there for her just like how Monika was there for Sayori. And she doesn’t say “it’s real, trust me, I’m here” she says like “that’s terrifying.” Or what I’m getting at is that she doesn’t try to argue with how Monika feels with logic and reasoning but comforts her and empathizes and says that she’ll always be here for her.

Also the other girls help her too, maybe Monika falls asleep after all that cuz she’s not good at sleeping in school nights and she’s been staring at the ceiling too much recently and she’s exhausted. And they come over and are like “Monika we’re here for you” or something. Either way, hurt/comfort u guys.

I need fics about Monika’s derealization tbh.

I might write this fic, but I’ll probably need to research into derealization and how to handle it. Cuz I seriously doubt u should say “no, everything’s real” and logic ur way through it, but I’m not sure if just saying “that sounds scary” is useful, or if you should affirm ur realness. I would believe that you shouldn’t argue with their feelings, you should affirm their feelings, and provide urself as a place of security without confirming or denying the state of reality. I think. But I’ve never experienced derealization, I have no idea how to handle it, and I’ve never supported someone else who was experiencing it. I’m also not a professional. So I’d need to research it greatly

Loulan and Shisui are both masks for Shisui equally. Shisui allows her to peruse her loves and passions freely, and lets responsibility fall off her back, but she doesn’t really behave like that 24/7. You know how autistic people mask? Yeah that’s kinda what Shisui is. While she still does this as Tamamao, u also gotta consider: she got a little decoration of her special interest, and masking is BAKED into autistic women (socially). Loulan while a mask in she cannot pursue her passions and is forced to do things she deeply dislikes, I think it’d be interesting/funny tbh if how she behaves is kinda how she actually is (too an extent). Like not talking a lot, flat face, extravagant and weird clothing, lounging rather than sitting—I think it’d be kinda funny if she’s unmasking (though still playing a role). Or perhaps Loulan is easier to play, not more enjoyable, but easier. I mean she had to be done accurately by her lady’s in waiting, and I wouldn’t be surprised if (not knowing her) they flanderized Loulan so much that it became extremely easy to “be” Loulan. Kinda what I’m getting at here is that Shisui was masking to be seen as more friendly or almost charming in her weirdness while hiding the less offensive weird traits, and Loulan was her opportunity to let her more offensive weird traits show while still masking her desires. One lets her be free to pursue what she wants, while the other allows her to act herself so long as she can’t purpose her desires. I think the last time we see Loulan and now Tamamao is closer to how she acts on a more daily basis and when not in front of an arthropod.

Following that, I think Shisui (as I’m gonna call her as it’s the name we know best) is autistic for pretty much the reasons above, but also when she’s playing Shisui, she still wasn’t great socially😭

And following THAT, Maomao’s autistic too. For obvious reasons.

Following that, don’t think Suirei is autistic—she doesn’t really seem to have any special interest (closest I could think of is the resurrection potion but that’s Maomao’s hyper fixation not hers😭), and other symptoms could be explained with C-PTSD. But I COULD see it. More so I think it could create an interesting dynamic between her and Shisui.

Also this is technically canon sorta, but Shisui had BOILING WATER poured on her hands (I watched the dub so all I knew was “hot water was tossed on her” not BOILING and not on her HANDS) and having boiling water poured on her hands even if just for half a second, would/should be enough for a 3rd degree burn. At least a 2nd. And repeatedly?? Yeah she’d have horrible burn scars all over her hands. Of course if she’s not being hyperbolic. But I wouldn’t be surprised if she wasn’t, I mean her mom locked Suirei in a venomous creature pit and said “good luck!!” even though she could DIE, so like…

But the true head canon is that Shisui’s hand function is FUCKED, her grip it terrible, she lacks dexterity, and due to the repeated nature of the burns her nails either are incredibly deformed or are missing entirely.

Following up, no evidence but it seems right-Shenmei after burning Shisui’s hands (or I guess in this context Loulan’s) immediately went “OMG what have I done!! My poor baby!!” And became very mothering and nurturing all of a sudden and it was VERY confusing for Shisui. I think it’d be neat if she had a complicated relationship with her mom past whats shown.

Follow up, Shisui inherited autism, and autism contributed to why Shenmei acts the way she does. Shenmei was already rejected growing up due to odd behaviors (autism), and already had low self confidence, however once that whole empire thing happened, her self confidence dropped even lower, resulting in her acting the way she does now.

New thing!! Shisui has a complicated relationship with arthropods, she envies how free they are. In flight for some, but for her, she envies how they are allowed to be “ugly.” However she also views herself as one in that uglyness and dehumanization.

So for context: I LOVE color blindness and researching it, I find it so interesting and any other color stuff in relation to it just as interesting (I’d love to get my hands on those filters that only filter true yellow light (not green or red))—Suirei is tetrachromatic, for no reason other than I think it’d be cool and it’s a fun parallel to Shisui. And she COULD be tetrachromatic as her father’s colorblind and she’s not. Actually tetrachromacy is unusually high in that village. Actually I’ll get back to Suirei. Because tetrachromacy is (more) common in that village, a culture within the women has risen to wear seemingly pure red or orange or yellow clothing, as some of the women can tell the colors apart. Even women without tetrachromacy have been known to do this. In addition, a lot of those one-color-clothing are made only in the village, as the clothing actually has patterns and sometimes drawings within the clothing, and that couldn’t be achieved elsewhere and also the colors that may look the same to a trichromat won’t go a tetrachromat, so the colors sometimes aren’t consistent.

Also because again, not everyone with a colorblind X chromosome and a non colorblind X chromosome is tetrachromatic (most aren’t to my knowledge), and the one-color-clothing is meant to have patterns, the clothing is often drawn on first and the dyes to color it are often sold with the labels differentiating them (done through tradition, while someone who’s making these dyes might not see the difference, they know that it’s a different color and so labels it), and so the village actually has names for these unique colors.

When Shisui was growing up and wanted to join in on this one-color-clothing, she’d often get it horribly wrong (given she’s colorblind), so Suirei would help her, but before Suirei was in her life, Shisui would often just go about in green and red and yellow clothing she SWORE was all orange. It turns out Shenmei just…didn’t label her paints or dyes. She just found it inconvenient.

Also when Shisui began to draw and paint, she painted Suirei, but painted with horribly wrong colors, she wanted to paint Suirei in secret as a surprise, so didn’t ask her what color each of them were because than it could give it away. This then became an annual thing she did, and Suirei labeled all the paints in the house she could to help Shisui, so after most of the paintings Shisui did were accurate enough, and got better and better at guessing colors. Then when she left she kinda went “why am I appealing to everyone else?” And she stopped caring about how her paintings looked to others if they looked right to her. She later then snuck back to China and left a new painting of Suirei, with mismatched and unusual colors. Suirei cried.

Go read it nowww!!

https://archiveofourown.org/works/79334901

Without and with lineart!

Honestly I think this piece isn’t as a good as it COULD be, and I still have ideas, so who knows!! Might improve upon it, might just be having an off art day (might also be burning myself out😭 oopsie daisies. I don’t get art block tho heh…art block is for losers (JOKE))

Anyways, this took me 3 hours and 30 minutes! Speedpaint below (flash warning tbh, I swapped between layers a lot)

The most ironic part is that the fever is totally the most dangerous symptom given it only lasts for 5 days, nothing else would get the chance to actually develop, Oda didn’t need to list off any other symptom than “horribly high fever” which is ALSO ironic because that’s the ONLY symptom we actually see😭 (I’m saying it’s ironic because I’m like 90% sure Oda just chose myocarditis and cerebritis because they’re the inflammation of the heart and brain, which are the 2 most vital organs, but neither would’ve been able to kill her within the time frame, and the fever (the thing he ESTABLISHED) would’ve)

White (or black depending on light or dark mode) text is the name and definition, blue text is the symptoms (for the symptoms), greens text is long term effects, red text is things that can cause it (for reference), and pink text is treatments sorry that it’s kind of ugly, I just need them to be distinct because otherwise this just becomes a wall of text:

Pain

Hyperpyrexia(fever over 40 degrees Celsius or 108 degrees Fahrenheit)-, irritability, extreme sleepiness, confusion, dehydration, fast heart rate, loss of consciousness, seizures, stiff muscles or muscle cramps, pressure/swelling of the brain (intracranial pressure), permanent brain damage, coma—ice bath—reduced life expectancy (28 day mortality 58%, 71% in 2 years), moderate to severe functional impairment in 33% after a year, 41% institutional care after a year, chronic kidney, liver or heart disfunction

Coinfection-many other illnesses introduced—from my research, it seems staph is introduced, as it’s in all of the symptoms that are actually symptoms, and it can be introduced inside from a bug bite

Staph-skin that is discolored(red-purple or brown depending on skin color) swollen hard warm and painful, blisters that break can look like burns, fever and chills, malaise(general feeling of sickness), serious pain—bacterima-sepsis, fever or chills, fast breathing/unable to catch breath, fast heart rate, confusion or disorientation, skin that is cold and sweaty, severe pain—toxic shock syndrome (some strains in wounds)-high fever, skin rash or color change that resembles underwear, stomach pain and vomiting, confusion, muscle aches, diarrhea—septic arthritis-knees shoulder hips fingers or toes-joint swelling, severe pain (in joint), fever. Can spread to others from touching the infected wound—can spread to others, however Luffy Zoro and Sanji are just built different (to my memory, in the manga they say they’ve never gotten sick, I think it was just Zoro and Luffy, or maybe just Luffy), and Vivi and Usopp are taking actual precautions. Or maybe it’s just that Nami’s immune system is too compromised dealing with the 5 day illness, so everyone else who has healthy immune systems wouldn’t catch it

Myocarditis-inflammation of the heart muscles—chest pain, fatigue, swelling of the legs ankles and feet, arrhythmias (rapid/irregular heart beats), shortness of breath, lightheadedness, flu-like symptoms (headache, body aches, joint pain, fever, sore throat)—staph, strep, diphtheria and Lyme, chagas—clots, long term arrhythmias, dilated cardiomyopathy—treat underlying problem, possibly medications to slow heart rate (I think)

Arteritis-inflammation of the arteries—*head pain in the temporal, scalp tenderness, jaw pain when chewing or opening mouth wide, fever, fatigue, unintended weight loss, vision loss or double vision (usually with jaw pain), sudden permanent vision loss, blood doesn’t reach where it should go, aneurism, reduced or absent pulse in limbs, (stroke symptoms, diarrhea, and/or chest pain)—staph, strep, brucella*—high dose intravenous antibiotics, surgical intervention* *I struggled to find anything about septic arteritis, as it’s not common, usually life threatening, and is spelled very similarly to septic arthritis. So most symptoms are of big cell arteritis, which doesn't have a specific known cause, but is theorized to be an autoimmune response, and is known for causing headaches. While the symptoms might still hold true for septic arteritis, they aren’t exactly the same thing, and might not apply. *I struggled to find anything about septic arteritis, thus the microorganisms that cause it might not actually cause septic arteritis or be associated with it, staph and strep seem to, as they can both get into the blood stream and cause sepsis, however, I’m not sure. *I struggled to find anything on septic arteritis, so treatments might not be accurate